If you live or work near Novato, you've no doubt visited Stafford Lake for a company picnic or friend's party. This Marin County park boasts a playground, picnic areas, softball fields, volleyball nets, lots of manicured green lawn, a disc golf course, and one hiking trail. The two-mile path is technically a loop, but one leg of the trail is undermaintained and tough to follow. It's long enough to provide some exercise satisfaction, but short enough for a quick get-away from a party, or to burn off any extra calories you may have consumed at a bbq.
     Stafford Lake, like the rest of Novato, is generally hot from late spring to early winter. If you plan on making a special visit to the park, spring is a good time for wildflowers, and in autumn the black oaks are pretty.
      Begin at the end of the paved parking lot. Although a dirt road leads off to the right, a sign points left to the Terwilliger Nature Trail. After a few steps on a paved path, you'll reach a T junction in front of the grassy lawn. Turn right; the path turns to dirt. With a small pond on the right and a seasonal creek on the left, willows thrive along the trail, along with some California bay, coast live oak, and buckeye. The broad trail emerges in grassland, and you'll walk past a large valley oak on the left. At 0.27 mile, just before a picnic area, follow the trail to the left (if you're visiting in the wet months of the year you may need to use the footbridge, on the far side of the picnic area). You'll cross the creekbed and step out at the edge of a flat grassy meadow. Steps are visible on the hillside straight ahead, but stay to the right as the trail curves around the hill. At 0.42 mile the loop begins, on the left, marked by a sign (the fire road only continues straight a few feet more, to the park boundary). Turn left onto Terwilliger Nature Trail.
     The narrow path heads uphill through grassland, with buckeye, coast live oak, white oaks, and California bay common trailside trees. Watch out for poison oak, which grows along the trail in shrubs throughout the grassland, and as a vine and ground cover in the woods. Terwilliger Nature Trail, open to hikers and equestrians only, ambles across the hillside, darting in and out of pockets of woods, occasionally turning right or left to make up elevation. The grade is easy. At 0.64 mile you'll reach a signed junction. The loop trail begins to degrade straight ahead. Turn right, toward the viewpoint.
     Still weaving uphill through grassland and clusters of hazelnut, California bay, blue, black, and coast live oak, buckeye, and even a few redwoods, Terwilliger Nature Trail remains an easy ascent. Look for a shaded bench off to the left, with a nice view down to the lake. Back in the woods the trail splits, with arrows pointing both ways. When I visited in July 2002, the path extending straight looked brand new, so perhaps this is a reroute. I took the new trail, which soon leaves the woods behind for a final climb through grassland. A few short switchbacks later, at 0.84 mile, you'll reach the end of the trail and the park boundary. You may want to sit on the bench and enjoy the views north of rolling oak-dotted hills. When you're ready to continue, retrace your steps back to the trailhead. (Note: the other end of the loop trail was overgrown when I visited, apparently a common situation. Paths that are part of the disc golf course add to the confusion. If you do attempt it, you may lose the trail -- but you can travel cross country since the flat meadow is nearly always visible downhill to the north.)

Total distance: 1.68 miles
Last hiked: Thursday, July 18, 2002


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